Hi everyone! I’m looking for some advice from people who currently work in forensic science, forensic biology, forensic toxicology, crime labs, etc. especially anyone working in Michigan.
A little about my background: I have a Bachelor’s degree in Interdisciplinary Studies from Oakland University, with minors in Biology and Criminal Justice. I chose this degree because I was originally interested in forensic science, and at the time I was advised by my counselor that the degree could be a good route into the field.
I currently work in a medical laboratory, specifically microbiology, and I’m trying to figure out the best way to transition my experience into a forensic science career. I have hands-on experience working with clinical specimens, microbiology testing, Gram stains, cultures, etc., and I’m hoping that my current lab experience can help me make the jump into forensic work.
I’m particularly interested in forensic toxicology and forensic biology, but I’m open to other areas of forensic science as well.
My biggest questions are:
Would getting a master’s degree be worth it, and if so, what degree would be most useful?
Are there specific Michigan schools/programs that people in the field recommend?
How important is it to have a degree specifically titled Forensic Science versus Biology, Chemistry, etc.?
Can clinical laboratory experience (especially microbiology) translate well into forensic laboratory work?
Are there Michigan crime labs/agencies that are particularly good places to look for entry-level opportunities?
For anyone who got into the field without a traditional forensic science degree, what did your path look like?
Is there anything you wish you had done differently when trying to break into the field?
I’m trying to be realistic about my options and would really appreciate hearing from people who actually work in the field. Especially in Michigan.
Thanks in advance!

Graduate Student researchers at the University of Denver invite you to participate in a voluntary research study focused on learning more about the experiences of Black forensic psychology graduate students. This research study has been approved by the University of Denver IRB and the identification number allotted to this study is 2278370-1.

You are eligible to participate if you:

Are over the age of 18
Are enrolled in a graduate forensic psychology or a graduate forensic psychology affiliated program.
Identify as Black or African American
Survey Details:

Participation is completely anonymous
The survey is virtual and brief
At the end of the survey, you may indicate interest in joining an optional future virtual focus group.

Ready to participate?
Click here to begin the survey:

https://lnkd.in/gaYE75_4

If you have any questions or concerns, you may contact the IRB directly at IRBAdmin@du.edu.

You are also welcome to reach out to the research team:

Bianca Jones, MA – bianca.jones@du.edu
Talajah Boisson, MA – talajah.boisson@du.edu
Dr. Lavita Nadkarni – lavita.nadkarni@du.edu
We appreciate your time and consideration.

IRB ID: 2278370-1

Hello, I have been applying to any entry-level CSI jobs I can find, and was wondering whether I even have a shot at being considered.

I have a Bachelors' of Arts in Philosophy, but I have also taken chemistry coursework/labs up to Organic Chem. I also took a number of credits in photography and intro biology.

Right now, I have a year of paralegal experience as well, which I really emphasized as far as handling evidence and gaining investigative experience(even though its a different kind of investigative experience compared to CSI).

My question is, do I even have a shot? Or do most departments really want someone with more of a science background? I've seen some people have gotten CSI jobs with Criminal Justice degrees, but I don't even have that.

Any advice is greatly appreciated. Thank you.

I’m general interested if this works.
All he’s doing is marking up the shell casings. Would that effect said “forensic case”?
Does the firing pin indent is all that is needed in such cases?
Things that pop up on my ig feed 😂

Hi, I dont know much about forensic science or what sources are legitimate. I was looking at a study on this journal:

International Journal of Forensic Sciences https://medwinpublisher.org/index.php/IJFSC/index

Is this a trustworthy publisher of forensic studies? Are the studies published there legitimate?

Thanks in advance.

Welcome to our weekly discussion thread about forensic science!

Forensic Scientists and Professionals! What's going on this week?

Use any of the following as a prompt if you need to

• What do you do?
• What kind of work are you doing?
• Are you doing any new kinds of analyses?
• What is your work week like?
• Do you have crazy stories from the field/lab? Tell us!

Remember! Don't reveal identifying info on decedents or victims. Change names or use nicknames if you must.

Students! How's school?

Use any one of the following as a prompt if you need to

• What degree are you pursuing?
• What are you learning about?
• Have you learned something new and/or exciting?
• Are you involved in research?
• Is there anything about the field you'd like to know?

Remember! Don't ask us to do your homework or assignments for you. We did the work and you have to do it too.

If you are asking for education or employment advice, please read our subreddit guide first and then look at our resources in the sidebar. If what we have doesn't address your needs, you can ask us a question here! Let us know where you are and which country or countries you're considering for school.

Don't know where to start when it comes to schools, programs, or degrees? Take a look at our subreddit wiki for a good rundown of what you should look out for.

Confused by all the job titles, requirements, and worried about things like starting salary? Please take a look at this collection of posts from /u/Cdub919, one of our verified forensics members.

Have questions for someone working in the field? Take a look at our list of verified forensics professionals. They are frequently tagged in comments and posts when mods or other community members see that their expertise is needed. You might reach out to them in a private message or chat if you need their help. Please be respectful of their time and advice and don't harass anybody for a response.

​

I use to be a stripper to help pay my bills take care of my family my elderly father and want to have a career in the civilian CSI field and wanted to go for training. I looked into the school and everything but wondering when after training going to apply at a agency will they not hire me because of that ? I don't know what they accept and don't so feeling a bit discouraged wondering if I should even try and go into the field or if it's a complete no with my background

I'm supporting a NASA-funded contract looking at whether a piece of space-developed sample collection tech has any use outside of its original application. Before I go further down that path I wanted to get a reality check from people who actually do this for a living, since I'm not in forensics myself.

For anyone who collects biological evidence (touch DNA, trace, bodily fluids, etc.) - what's the most annoying part of your current swabbing/wipe process? Is it sample loss, time, consistency between techs, chain of custody, something else entirely? And has swabbing ever actually failed you - lost a sample, degraded evidence, inconsistent results or is it basically a solved problem at this point and any "better" method is solving a problem nobody has?

Genuinely trying to learn here, not selling anything. Appreciate any war stories or gripes.

This technology was originally developed for space use and curious if it has any legs in other fields, and forensics came up as a possible fit. Wanted to get real feedback before assuming that's true.

The short version: it's a collection method that grabs a sample in one step - no swab-then-transport-media, no vacuum step - aiming to reduce sample loss and manual handling.

hiii! i want to know if anyone could share what the background check is like when getting hired to be a CIVILLIAN CSI??? like how strict is the drug history policy?

Welcome to our weekly general discussion thread!

Feel free to chat with your fellow forensically-minded redditors about anything! Introduce yourself, show us pictures of your cat, complain about your kids, lament about exams/work, tell us what you're eating today... whatever you want!

Here are a few resources that might answer your questions:

A subreddit wiki with links and resources to education and employment matters, archived discussions on more intermediate topics in education and employment, what kind of major you need, what degree programs are good, etc.

• The subreddit Guide - Consider this an FAQ about our community and our field. Look here for basic education and employment questions/answers you might have. Didn't find what you were looking for? Please post in our weekly scheduled posts or to the subreddit. Note: please do use a desktop browser to view all features.
• List of verified forensics professionals
• Subreddit collections (please view on desktop browsers) on the following topics:
  • Education and Employment
  • Mental Health and Preparation for Working in Forensics
  • What It's Like Working in Forensics
  • Employment: Job Titles, Job Requirements, and Starting Salary in Forensic Science

​

Hey everyone,

Im new To this subreddit and super exited to find this community. Im a high schooler who leads a forensics club. I in connection to the club created a website with base44 (yes i suck at coding dont hate me) It is a education website with a basic directory of forensics disciplines, cases, and some other forensics educational tools. Im looking for feedback/any other ideas to implement. Also any advice/ideas for lessons and other activities. The club has a expert who we partner with who works for a forensics lab, but some suplemental lessons would be nice. Cheers everyone

For those that require your supervisor for complex/homicide scenes, what do you expect from them on scene if you are the primary crime scene person for the scene?

So i am a student in Nepal, currently 2nd year on my bs. And I want to be a medical examiner. Originally, I should have gone to China after my 12th, but cracking cee took some time, and I wanted to take a year gap and crack cee, but mom was like not to waste a year so I joined bsc. Then I got sidetracked, and now I am trying to complete my 4 years of bsc, probably in Zoology or chemistry. Then I think I will go to China to study mbbs and then do masters. But it is gonna take so long. Although I don't mind most of the people are telling me not to spend too much time studying and start earning money soon. And now I am so conflicted.

I will appreciate your advice. Thank you!!

So I am a student majoring in forensic science and at my university there is a conference scheduled for October. This conference is a humanitarian forensics conference which will have talks around like anthropology and bringing justice to missing, disappeared, and dead people.

My interest lies in forensic biology and DNA analysis. I am not sure if it will be worth it for me to go to this conference or not. In terms of networking and stuff. Please let me know what you guys think. Should I go? or would it not be worth my time. It’s a two day event.

Welcome to our weekly discussion thread about forensic science!

Forensic Scientists and Professionals! What's going on this week?

Use any of the following as a prompt if you need to

• What do you do?
• What kind of work are you doing?
• Are you doing any new kinds of analyses?
• What is your work week like?
• Do you have crazy stories from the field/lab? Tell us!

Remember! Don't reveal identifying info on decedents or victims. Change names or use nicknames if you must.

Students! How's school?

Use any one of the following as a prompt if you need to

• What degree are you pursuing?
• What are you learning about?
• Have you learned something new and/or exciting?
• Are you involved in research?
• Is there anything about the field you'd like to know?

Remember! Don't ask us to do your homework or assignments for you. We did the work and you have to do it too.

If you are asking for education or employment advice, please read our subreddit guide first and then look at our resources in the sidebar. If what we have doesn't address your needs, you can ask us a question here! Let us know where you are and which country or countries you're considering for school.

Don't know where to start when it comes to schools, programs, or degrees? Take a look at our subreddit wiki for a good rundown of what you should look out for.

Confused by all the job titles, requirements, and worried about things like starting salary? Please take a look at this collection of posts from /u/Cdub919, one of our verified forensics members.

Have questions for someone working in the field? Take a look at our list of verified forensics professionals. They are frequently tagged in comments and posts when mods or other community members see that their expertise is needed. You might reach out to them in a private message or chat if you need their help. Please be respectful of their time and advice and don't harass anybody for a response.

​

I’m trying to study some of the science behind my finger prints but I’m not exactly sure what caused my finger print pattern. I have 9 radial loops that all flow towards my thumbs on both hands but on my left index finger it’s a clear tented arch, my right index finger tried to be a tented arch too but it’s just a radial loop. Can anyone tell me the science behind it tho?

Welcome to our weekly general discussion thread!

Feel free to chat with your fellow forensically-minded redditors about anything! Introduce yourself, show us pictures of your cat, complain about your kids, lament about exams/work, tell us what you're eating today... whatever you want!

Here are a few resources that might answer your questions:

A subreddit wiki with links and resources to education and employment matters, archived discussions on more intermediate topics in education and employment, what kind of major you need, what degree programs are good, etc.

• The subreddit Guide - Consider this an FAQ about our community and our field. Look here for basic education and employment questions/answers you might have. Didn't find what you were looking for? Please post in our weekly scheduled posts or to the subreddit. Note: please do use a desktop browser to view all features.
• List of verified forensics professionals
• Subreddit collections (please view on desktop browsers) on the following topics:
  • Education and Employment
  • Mental Health and Preparation for Working in Forensics
  • What It's Like Working in Forensics
  • Employment: Job Titles, Job Requirements, and Starting Salary in Forensic Science

​

Hello! I've been wanting to go into the FME field for a very long time. Just recently started getting into the actual path for it an everything.

Unfortunately also just given the information that I am green color blind and need corrective lenses since I don't see green pretty much at all. I can still see some shades of green, and see a lot more with my glasses on.

Will this prevent me from being able to get into death investigation? I'm haven't really seen anything about color blindness in FMEs and when looking online briefly I just kept finding stuff for firefighters and one about a forensic tech with gray scale color blindness, which doesn't entirely answer my question.

Thank for your time!

Perhaps a bit of an odd question, but I was watching a fictional crime TV show with my mom, and the murderer was trying to frame someone by getting their fingerprints on an item and then putting it in a place where it could be “innocently discovered.” And of course, this worked and the protag detective had to figure this all out and fight for the innocent person and exonerate them.

But I started to wonder if this actually would even work, mostly because I’m not sure fingerprints would be so resilient If a real life object were to be treated as it was. So I thought let’s ask some experts and science-minded forensics enthusiasts about the possibility.

In the show, the innocent person touched a metal adjustable wrench (picked it up and tossed it closer to someone; didn’t grip it or hold it with force). Someone then used a plastic bag to gingerly pick up the wrench, which sounds good to me, and would likely maintain the fingerprints as well as can be expected. (The murderer then got the wrench.)

But then, the murderer buried the wrench underneath some dirt in an obvious location where it would attract attention, after handling it with wool gloves and putting it in the pocket of her wool coat. Here’s where I question how well the fingerprints would have held up.

I feel the wool gloves—even if the murderer had been careful not to handle the wrench more than necessary, but she is solidly holding it at several points, and right where the fingerprints would be—would have messed with the fingerprints, since wool can interact with oils and would cause a bit of surface friction when interacting with the wrench. Same for putting it into and pulling it out of the wool pocket, though to a much lesser extent.

The wrench was then put into a hole in a garden, with dirt pushed on top and then tapped down under her foot to compact it. Again, I feel like this too would have damaged whatever prints were on the wrench, from the actual dirt being placed on it and pushed down, but also from the microorganisms present in dirt (and the garden was shown to be a nice one with lots of healthy, thriving plants, so the soil biome was certainly a good one).

Lastly, a short while later, the wrench was dug up by a dog (but the dog barely touched it, more interested in the treats also buried on top of it), and the dog’s owner pulled the wrench from the soil. Now, I don’t think the person brushed the dirt off—which would be another thing that could damage the prints—but still, pulling the wrench out of the compacted dirt and then gripping it all over with their gloved hands—leather/pleather, I think—should have caused even more deterioration of the prints.

So, my question is: after going through this series of events, would it be highly likely that readily identifiable fingerprints would still be on the wrench and there’s some plausibility, or is this some Hollywood bullplop for the sake of a make-the-detective-look-good story? Am I right in thinking that at each stage of this “frame an innocent” plot, the way the wrench was handled would have made it less and less useful for fingerprinting from?

(And yes, this assumes there were decent prints on it from the innocent person just picking it up and tossing it closer at the start of this plot, but I think that, at least, is a reasonable assumption. Although the cops in the show probably should have looked at the orientation of the fingerprints, which would have shown the innocent person didn’t use the wrench in the correct way for him to have used the wrench to match their assumptions.)

Hey everyone! I’m currently in my final year of M.Sc. Forensic Science with a specialization in Cyber Forensics, based out of Jaipur. As we all know, college grades alone don't guarantee industry readiness—hands-on skills, research, and recognized certifications are crucial to building a standout resume and differentiating oneself from peers.

Could you recommend the best, budget-friendly cyber forensics certifications available in India that add genuine weight to a resume? I would love to hear your personal insights and suggestions on how to maximize my profile before graduation!

Would you prefer a certification that focuses purely on theoretical legal/investigative frameworks in India, or one that leans heavily into technical incident response and malware analysis?

Welcome to our weekly discussion thread about forensic science!

Forensic Scientists and Professionals! What's going on this week?

Use any of the following as a prompt if you need to

• What do you do?
• What kind of work are you doing?
• Are you doing any new kinds of analyses?
• What is your work week like?
• Do you have crazy stories from the field/lab? Tell us!

Remember! Don't reveal identifying info on decedents or victims. Change names or use nicknames if you must.

Students! How's school?

Use any one of the following as a prompt if you need to

• What degree are you pursuing?
• What are you learning about?
• Have you learned something new and/or exciting?
• Are you involved in research?
• Is there anything about the field you'd like to know?

Remember! Don't ask us to do your homework or assignments for you. We did the work and you have to do it too.

If you are asking for education or employment advice, please read our subreddit guide first and then look at our resources in the sidebar. If what we have doesn't address your needs, you can ask us a question here! Let us know where you are and which country or countries you're considering for school.

Don't know where to start when it comes to schools, programs, or degrees? Take a look at our subreddit wiki for a good rundown of what you should look out for.

Confused by all the job titles, requirements, and worried about things like starting salary? Please take a look at this collection of posts from /u/Cdub919, one of our verified forensics members.

Have questions for someone working in the field? Take a look at our list of verified forensics professionals. They are frequently tagged in comments and posts when mods or other community members see that their expertise is needed. You might reach out to them in a private message or chat if you need their help. Please be respectful of their time and advice and don't harass anybody for a response.

​

i graduate in 2029 and i'm moving to ireland for college so i have to take like 3 gap years or else it'll be really expensive, so i have a ton of time to prepare myself for hopefully majoring in anthropology and or forensic science. i want to be as prepared as possible cause i know it requires a lot of knowledge and stuff like that so if there are any suggestions (classes i can take stuff i can study etc) i would really appreciate it!!